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Strolling down the justifiably-famous 465-yard finishing hole under sumptuous Georgia skies the other day, as a spectator, just another part of the gallery, Mark Calcavecchia caught sight of an old nemesis.

“You know, I walked right by that bunker, again,” muses Calcavecchia, calling from Augusta on Day Two of the 2014 Masters. “Kinda looked at it, hard, and thought ‘Well, shoot, it’d have been nice if it’d hit the lip or something.’

“I get asked about it a lot. And all these guys walking around here with green jackets … It’d be nice to have one of my own.”

The year was 1988, Sunday, among those azaleas golf pundits wax poetically about, and Calcavecchia found himself tied for the lead in golf’s most prestigious event with Sandy Lyle standing on the 18th tee box. When Lyle plopped his tee shot into THAT fairway bunker, the advantage shifted to the big man from Laurel, Neb.

Or so it seemed.

Unruffled, Lyle hit a 7-iron they still talk about in reverent tones (some even going so far as to name the The Sandy Lyle Bunker), his ball bouncing past the flag, skittering up the slope of a tier running across the green before softly, almost caressingly, rolling back to within six feet of the pin.

Lyle then drained the downhill putt to become the first UK-born golfer to win the Masters (when he presided over the Cham­pions Dinner the following April, he wore a Scottish kilt under his green jacket, piercing the haggis with his sword to serve his peers), leaving Calcavecchia to curse at the sand.

He’d have to console himself by besting Wayne Grady and Greg Norman in a four-hole playoff to lay his mitts on the Claret Jug and win the British Open on the links of Royal Troon.

Nobody’s idea of a shoddy consolation prize at all.

As a past Major winner, Calcavecchia and his wife Brenda are invited back to Augusta each year.

“We’ve been here all week,” Calcavecchia said. “It’s been fun, a good week. On the other hand, it’d be a lot more fun if I was playing of course. But this time my wife and I decided to come up and just hang out. We’re actually in our motorhome and I have a corporate outing on Monday. As it turns out, I’ve just about exhausted my spectating. It’s tiring walking around out there, and it’s pretty tough to see.

“So we’re gonna drive home to Jupiter (Fla.) tomorrow and catch the final round Sunday on TV.”

While Calcavecchia was watching Bubba Watson shoot 4-under to take the lead at Augusta on Friday, the annual Shaw Charity Classic was announcing him, defending champion Rocco Mediate and Kenny Perry, a 14-time winner on the PGA Tour and two-time Senior Major winner on the Champions Tour as it first three players to confirm for the Aug. 27-31 at Canyon Meadows.

“I’m a big fan of Canada,” Calcavecchia said. “I won twice over in B.C., the Air Canada Championships in ’97 and of course the Canadian Open at Shaugnessy in ’05 and then I won in Montreal. I also made those nine birdies in a row at Glen Abbey” — from the 12th through 19th, still a PGA record — “six or seven years ago. So I’ve had a lot of good things happen to me in Canada.

“Not quite sure what it is. Must be the good beer you have up there. Got a little more kick to it. That must be it.”

In a career that has encompasses 13 PGA Tour wins and four Ryder Cups, ’89 in Scotland ranks at the top of the list.

“I was just playing really well at the time. I’d already won two tournaments that year, Phoenix and Los Angeles. I’d won a tournament in the fall the year before and the Australian Open. So four wins in six months. I was confident, playing well, and I had some good things happen to me, which of course you need to win any tournament, let alone a major.

“I made a 50-footer for par on 11 and then threw my chip in the hole on 12 and from then on I played great, birdied three of the last six. I got a little help from Wayne Grady, who bogeyed 14 and 17 and the next thing you know I’m in a playoff with him and Normal. It just kinda all happened, really fast.

“Norman got a bad break, lucky for me, catching the corner of that bunker and the suddenly I’m holding the Claret Jug.”

Seems bunker luck seems to have a way of evening out.

He missed out on the inaugural Shaw Classic due to injury.

“Last year I was hurting real bad,” Calcavecchia said. “Actually all year. I was hurtin’ in Seattle and I thought if I took a couple weeks off I could defend my championships in Montreal. Turns out the rest really didn’t do me any good. I had a torn rib muscle that never really healed up. Not until the last week of October and first week of November did it start feeling better.

“But I’ve gotten a lot of great reports from the guys who were there, from the size of the crowds to the course, good week of weather, to the restaurants. Everyone said Calgary was just fantastic, gave it five stars.

“I was sorry to miss out last year. But I’ll be there this time. And I’m very much looking forward to it.”

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